The Waking Sleep
by MThorneMichigan
Summary: "The Waking Sleep" is one character one shot based Daryl and an incident that has taken place. I am a huge lover of Daryl Dixon Angst. Please post reviews. Enjoy!


The Waking Sleep

Disclaimer:

This Walking Dead Fan Fiction is a short fan fiction and is complete. The characters and the premise of The Walking Dead is the property of Robert Kirkman and the AMC cable network. This story is purely for recreation and in no way will I receive a profit from it. Hopefully just some good reviews. =)

The Waking Sleep

He thought he was dying. It was an odd feeling. Daryl could feel the coldness in his limbs. His breath caught in lung. He felt as if he was clutching on to something but couldn't determine if it was real or imaginary. Alive or spiritual. Something inside of him was telling to hold on yet part of him wanted to let go, to die. To go beyond this sick world and find some sort of peace. Something else though was keeping him here.

He didn't want to open his eyes. The secluded darkness shielded him from sight of what would have been an abandoned shack. It littered with debris, dead animal carcasses and now, rotting corpses. The stench could not be avoided but the horrible vision could be kept at bay a while longer. In the darkness he turned his head toward the window. He was about a foot away from it and the broken pane allowed some fresh air to mask the scent of decaying flesh. He was tired, so damn tired_. 'Just go …I'm done here' _

_ Light, as bright as the sun, fell on him. Trying to see it source, he squinted. Where he was or what was beyond it? It was a large window…a window with bars. _

_ The tombs. Carol called it home. He thought it strange she would call that place home but now he wished he could go back. Turn back time before the attack, before the sickness. He failed them. Michonne was right to go after him. He should never have talked her out of going to Macon. He should have helped her find the bastard._

_ He could see their faces. They were happy. Peaceful. Such moments were rare for them. He felt warm inside now. His heart swell at the sight of his friends. Rick stood by Hershel in the fields. Carl was talking Michonne. He could see Glenn teasing Maggie, Carol with the kids and Beth with lil ass-kicker. _

_Beth…_

_Beth! He saw her. She saw him. His chest felt tight. She stood, leaving Judith on the ground to play. He moved toward her but the closer he tried to get the further away she was, slipping into the dark recesses of the tombs. Her appearance was changing before his eyes. She grew thinner, disheveled, and hungry. Her smiling face had become a mix of anger and sadness. The tightness in his chest felt like vise squeezing the air and blood from him. He screamed out to the others, searched them for help but they were gone. The field was now strewn with dead bodies. He turned to Beth. She was so far away laying on the ground. Agony in her eyes and tears on her soiled face. She was reaching up to him…pleading for his help._

_The light fades. Its brightness succumbs to the darkness. Cold and empty. Sick and alone…Beth was gone. They all were gone. He shivered. His shivers turn to a constant shaking. All his life he had felt alone but then it was bearable. That was because it was normal, it was what he was used to. This. This was different. This was a vast emptiness and emptiness is nothing. How could nothing feel so painful? _

_He knew why it hurt. Just like his hair and skin and his body and soul, they were a part of him. They were gone now and he was here, left to walk amongst the walking dead, the marauders, the pillagers, the psychos and maniacs, the desperate and the lost. The Cannibals!_

Daryl bolted upright. Bile filled his mouth. He turned to his side and began to retch, expelling the vileness that was within him. At some point in the night the clouds had cleared. The room was bathed in dim pale light of the moon. The dead bodies of the hunters laid where they had fallen. He killed them, killed all of them. He felt no remorse.

He saw the trunk too. It was real. All of it. The dead hunters, the rotting flesh of walkers, the bare bones of animals and walkers, the stench in the air and the vile taste in his mouth. It was all real. Bones of walkers? Before he assumed that was what they were. Some may have been but he knew now in that corner laid the bones of the living.

He had to leave.

He promised her he would. He promised Beth he would leave this place.

He struggled to stand. He found his bow and walked over to the dead bodies of the hunters. He extracted the bolts he had left from their bodies. He found his knife. It laid beside the trunk, where he last used it. In the moonlight he could see it, but he felt it as if it was plunging deep into heart. He picked it off and carefully wiped the blood from it blade. His left hand rested on the trunk. He gently stroked it the smooth wooden top. Moments later and lost in thoughts of her, he knelt beside it and blanketed it with his torso, his knife still in his hand. He stared its steely edge. It would be so easy to end all of this now, but he made a promise to her.

He stood. He grabbed the side handle of the trunk and dragged it outside. The land surrounding the shack was littered with debris, wooden boards and soiled household items. He search the ground for the broken shovel he saw earlier. In his quest he turned over soiled items of other people lives. He didn't find it strange that he thought about Lori now and the time they spent on the highway. _"This is a graveyard"_. The cars and trucks stuffed the valuable things of those who died. Daryl found what he was looking for and head back to the trunk. He stopped and looked around again. _"This is a graveyard"_

Not here. Not this place. Not with them.

The morning sun crested the ridge and it's ray washed down on the valley below. The air was still chilled but the site before him was beautiful. He sat under a canopy of a massive tree. He legs were propped up and on them was a board. He took his knife and chipped more at the piece of wood. Satisfied, he set the board aside and looked at the view before him.

It was beautiful. It was a clearing he and Beth rested at several days ago. Days ago that felt like ages. To him it was an advantage point. The backside of the hilltop in which he now sat was steep, and thick with brush, making it difficult for walkers to climb. It also kept the scent of their living flesh away from the walkers. Before him was a meadow that tapered off into valley. The open field provide a clear view of any threats. The warmer days hinted that spring was approaching. In Georgia, winters bring about a mild dormant stage, not the full fledge de-foliage of the north but more of stalled or a momentary stillness of life. Now, it was it evident, the vibrancy of new life was approaching.

Daryl looked to his left, to the mound of freshly turned soil. It was a beyond the canopy of branches of a large oak. It was here he laid Beth to rest. She never stated it but he could tell she loved this place. He saw the practical side of this hilltop. She saw it for its beauty and it peacefulness.

Daryl stood. He gathered up the wood he had with him. They were pieces he had found laying out the shack. He fashioned two pieces into a, cross using twine he had in his pack. The other board was flat, most likely from a busted up crate. With his stock end of his crossbow he drove the cross in to the ground, then he secured the wood board to the cross. He stood and took a step back, surveying the site.

It was done. She is at peace now.

_Beth Greene_

_Beloved Daughter_

_Sweet Sister_

_Dear Friend_

Her passing sadden him. Hell, it was ripping him apart. But this… this was right. He couldn't bury her at that shack. It was a place of hell and carnage. She deserved better. Hershel and Maggie would have wanted this for her. _Yes…this was right._

Daryl wasn't trying to right a wrong. He knew no amount of rights can undo the wrongs he have done. He was responsible for this grave and the graves of the others. He failed them and it is this world he deserves. He didn't know if there was a heaven or hell. He did hope though, for Beth sake. Hoped she had found peace and that peace is beside her father and amongst the others.

He had to go now. He made a promise to her, a promise to carry on_. Other must have survived. You need to find them, Daryl._ She said that. Even as she laid there bleeding to death, she had hope. He would carry will continue to walk on this plane. This place where the dead walk amongst the living and feed off the lives others. This place where the sickest of mankind resides, _feeding off the lives of others. Defiling what is sacred and pure. Precious and kind. Daryl will walk this plane between heaven and hell. The real and the unreal. Which is not a dream but a nightmare._

He will carry on for a promise. Amongst the walking dead. In his waking sleep.


End file.
